GHB Addiction

by Erowid

Updated July 2001
First version: July 1999

Now that GHB has been around for a while, reports are surfacing from people who have problems regulating their own use (habituation) as well as from those who experience physical withdrawal symptoms (addiction) after periods of heavy use. These seem similar in level to the habituation and addiction that occur with heavy alcohol use, the main difference being that people generally feel better after coming down off of a single heavy use of GHB
than they do with heavy alcohol hangovers, so this can lead to a perception that GHB
has less negative side effects when used heavily.

Unfortunately for users, the effects of constant use of GHB may have some very negative
physical and mental side effects. There are reports of very serious withdrawal
symptoms including some reported deaths documented by Jo Ellen Dyer of the California Poison Control Center
and a collection of negative GHB-related info and forums can be found at Trinka Porrata's Project GHB.

Habituation
Many people enjoy the effects of GHB enough that they find themselves using
it more frequently than they intended to or are comfortable with.
Using GHB every weekend can turn into a few times a week or every night and can,
for some people, turn into several times a day. People who find themselves
using GHB daily or multiple times a day for periods of weeks or months often
report that they have some difficulty ceasing use. Some people have also report
that after using GHB daily for many months, strange psycho-physical effects, such
as hearing bells constantly, were experienced.

Addiction
Physical withdawal symptoms appear in some people who stop using GHB after more
than a few consecutive days of repeated use. Symptoms can include difficulty sleeping,
anxiety, edginess, chest pain and tightness, muscle and bone aches, sensitivity to
external stimuli (sound, light, touch), dysphoria, and mental dullness. The
symptoms seem to last between a few days and 2 to 3 weeks as the body comes back into balance. We have received reports from a handful of individuals who have had difficulty ceasing use. For at least some percentage of regular users, the combination of mental habituation and physical withdrawal symptoms can lead to heavy use with great difficulty stopping.

GHB withdrawal occurs in most people who use it for more than one day in a row
and the hangover from GHB use could possible be called a mild form of withdrawal,
since the hangover can be treated with additional doses of GHB / 14b.

Treatment
Many GHB users are able to stop using by themselves by quitting 'cold turkey'
or by tapering down over the course of 14 days. We've recieved several reports
from heavy users who have described an inability to stop cold, but had luck
with tapering down over a couple weeks.

GHB Withdrawal is being treated with Benzodiazepines (valium, librium, ativan, etc),
as well as barbiturates, other gabaneric drugs such as gabapentin, beta blockers
to treat some of the unpleasant muscle/heart effects, vitamins. Antipsychotics
are used in some of the worst cases. From GHB Withdrawal Syndrome:

Most patients in GHB with-drawal have an extremely high tolerance to the
sedating effects of benzodiazepines and require large frequent doses similar to those
required for the treatment of severe alcohol withdrawal.

Relapse
For some users, they find themselves drawn to GHB after they've stopped using it,
although this appears to be a minority of heavy users (the data we have is very limited).
GHB can occupy a similar place to other addictive/habituating drugs in that it
is used to reduce anxiety, manage stress, decrease social anxiety, etc. For some
people, it is extremely difficult to let go of using it in this way.